Carrel

Carrel, ARMAND, a celebrated French publicist and republican leader, was born at Ronen in 1800, and was educated in the military school of St Cyr. After serving for some years in the army, he went to Paris, and devoted his attention to political and historical studies. In 1830, in connection with Thiers and Mignet, he became editor of the National, the ablest and most spirited of the journals opposed to the government of Charles X. Carrel's colleagues being employed by the new government of Louis-Philippe, he was left to conduct the National himself, which he did with a spirit and a freedom such as had not been witnessed in France for a long time. On more than one occasion he checked the arbitrary power which the government attempted to exercise, and gained the high admiration and esteem of the popular party. Government prosecutions of course followed his outspokenness, and heavy fines were decreed against him; but these were paid by public subscription, and each conviction only made his journal more famous. Carrel, however, dreaded revolution as much as he hated despotism, and had no sympathy with many of those who looked up to him as a leader. Provoked into a duel with Emile de Girardin, by an attack on his personal character, Carrel was mortally wounded, and died 24th July 1836. Littre and Paulin edited his Œuvres Politiques et Littéraires (5 vols. 1857-58).